N.F.L. Commissioner Roger Goodell said on Thursday that the league was looking at a variety of ways to shorten game broadcasts, including trimming some advertising, to keep the action moving.
The league has seen its television ratings plunge this season, something that Goodell has said is related to a number of factors, including the intense interest in the presidential elections, as well as shifts in the way fans have been watching games.
Though television ratings are down by double digits so far this season, Goodell said that N.F.L. ratings had risen 27 percent in the past decade even as ratings for prime-time television had fallen 36 percent.